For this month we are reading the classic modern Japanese novel, Silence, by Shusaku Endo. It comes highly recommended. Here is the description from Amazon.

Seventeenth-century Japan: Two Portuguese Jesuit priests travel to a country hostile to their religion, where feudal lords force the faithful to publicly renounce their beliefs. Eventually captured and forced to watch their Japanese Christian brothers lay down their lives for their faith, the priests bear witness to unimaginable cruelties that test their own beliefs. Shusaku Endo is one of the most celebrated and well-known Japanese fiction writers of the twentieth century, and Silence is widely considered to be his great masterpiece.

My colleague, Van Gessel is the foremost authority on Endo and is the consultant for the upcoming Martin Scorsese film based on the book. He may be able to join us for our discussion.